


Enclave

by blubberpatchcumquat (VanillaSkyce), VanillaSkyce



Series: Within These Temple Walls [1]
Category: Steven Universe (Cartoon)
Genre: A Collection of Stories, Gen, Non-Linear Narrative, Vignette
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-07-07
Updated: 2020-01-02
Packaged: 2020-06-23 19:51:32
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 979
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19708255
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/VanillaSkyce/pseuds/blubberpatchcumquat, https://archiveofourown.org/users/VanillaSkyce/pseuds/VanillaSkyce
Summary: A collection of stories told by gems. Some who serve their purpose. Others who have found it.





	1. Pressure

**Author's Note:**

> I'll be honest with you, this work isn't as... well thought out as some of my other ones. It's not just an idle curiosity, rather, it's borne of it. It's a compilation of the different perspectives through which different gems view the empire, and what that means to them.
> 
> I'm so fascinated by the potential lore of the gem universe, and this fandom has gone so many ways with it, I'd like to try my hand at it too. Hopefully, as I go along, you'll be as instilled with the same sense of wonder as I've come to have, imagining the destinies that each curious little sentient rock has for themselves.

She was one of the first gems to arrive in the hand ships. Well, that wasn’t technically true. But she was one of the first to lay her hands upon the foreign soil of Earth. Soon, they came in droves. Divisions of clones upon clones of herself, all tuned to a singular purpose.

For Peridot Facet-3F5M-Cut-8XM, that purpose was cataloguing every animal, plant and wayward particle that was unknown to Homeworld’s data archives. 

She knelt down to pinch some of this new planet's native soil. It crumbled and slipped through her fingers. How quaint. She felt like an explorer. A pioneer! A conqueror, even. Allowing herself a slight snicker at the thought, she dusted herself off and went in search of her leader. The one who spoke for their Empire.

\------

“She called me her friend. I didn’t even think about what I was to her.” an excited light grey Pearl was telling her as they stepped off the warp pad. 

“She called me Peri. As if my name wasn’t short enough already. You’re not performing your function either, are you?”

“No,” she replied mirthfully. Her journey had spanned centuries-- she’d first served under a Calcite on one of Yellow Diamond’s colonies, then under a Spinel on one of its moons. Then a Morganite, and a Chrysoberyl. Her efficiency was rewarded to various degrees, and she was lucky to have masters that left her well enough alone, but never truly alone. Not like this. “In all my years, I’d never been asked such a question. What would **_I_ **want to do? It’s absolutely unprecedented, it’s-- preposterous! But she assured me, the Earth was vast. I told her I didn’t know what she meant. After all, I’ve been to most of Yellow’s colonies. All of them bigger than this one."

" ’Just tell me honestly?’ "

"That surprised me too! She just sat there waiting and smiling at me. I felt like I was in a dream.”

“So how’re you serving her now?”

“Well… I told her I liked the stars. And that I could spend millennia just studying them.”

“Cartographer?”

“Yes. And what of you?”

She thought of the plants and the fragile soil that seeped through her fingers. What she _wanted?_

“I’d like to… tend the flowers I suppose.” the Peridot paused. Stopping just a few feet short of an image of the Diamond who made her, engraved against the wall of the base’s makeshift chapel. Her yellow crest loomed, dark and tall and imposing, as did the many planets that spanned between her hands. “Pearl… can you feel it?”

Pearl followed Peridot’s gaze up to the image of her creator. “Feel what?”

“The pressure.”


	2. New Light

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "Here on Earth, everyone is welcome." - Steven Universe.

For the last three months, the monstrous gem had been camping out in an old makeshift rock hut, far off from the city on the beach that was always abuzz with activity. She stays out of the way of other gems and people, and if she can't do that, she keeps her helmet on. Always.

All she has to her name are just that. A helmet, her rank, now defunct, and the tarp she stole from the school down the hill. Those are the things she was left with. She chooses this lifestyle as a comforting reminder of a time long since past. A time where her station made her more than what she is now. She moves a boulder around with one stubby finger to support the foundation of the hut a little better, the movement making the tarp she'd used as a makeshift roof fall unceremoniously over her head. There was a time she'd have flown into a furious rage from that indignity alone, but now she simply wraps the tarp around her tighter. The fabric is so thick and insulating, it feels just like her hole. A warm womb in the middle of the earth, when things were simple and not so damn complicated.

She spends her days alone. Other people are an unpredictable source of pain and confusion, and even though they've been taught otherwise, she knows they feel the same way about her. Some react with a practiced cordiality. Some are overcome by some personal and probably well-deserved grief. Some with outright hostility. Those she admires. But some have a history with her, and when _they_ come knocking, it's always with an infuriatingly patronising offer of help. Help. For her. Homeworld's Ultimate. That was the most painful lesson of being reborn-- It's better to be alone. So she's always alone now. Except for the small holo-token they'd left her.

One night, she sits with her head against her knees and listens to the sounds of distant construction and laughter. She hasn't seen anyone in around a week, but she can hear them. Somehow that makes the loneliness worse. More potent.

"Did you know," a projected hologram of Chrysoberyl murmurs, bright and gentle. The purple gem on her left hand reflecting the glint of moonlight. "That on the Beach City, they are celebrating? They call it the New Light. It is a celebration of friendship, hope and new beginnings."

The hulking gem keeps her eyes closed and forces down her bitterness. The silence lingers between them, heavy and filled with unsaid things, until the hardlight hologram of Chrysoberyl makes to tap her on her shoulder. "To feel good, they say to each other, Happy New Light."

Still, the gem says nothing. And her silence makes her sick with herself. She thought the holo-token would be just as patronising as the rest of them, but so far it's turned out to be anything but. Chrysoberyl was quiet, patient and incredibly unassuming. A well of relentless optimism. And as infurating as that is, it's also heartbreaking, and comforting, and a relief all at once. She wasn't going to disappoint her.

There's been too much disappointment in her life already.

"Happy New Light." she says.


End file.
